"The Serpent's Teeth"
(A Tom Riddle love story)

9th September 1944

New week, new luck.

Yawning, I sit at breakfast and let the voices of my friends rush past me.

Casey and James argue over the next Quidditch practice, that's taking place on their anniversary.

After all, he's the Quidditch Captain and could change the dates so that it doesn't get in the way of such an important day, no matter how much he likes Quidditch.

If you ask me, he has forgotten that they have their second anniversary.

For him it is a day like any other.

Men will never understand it.

Tracey is currently talking to Sasha who listens attentively to her...or at least pretends to do so.

His regular nodding in response seems to keep her satisfied.

Jacklyn sits silently beside me and throws furtive glances at Sasha.

Has he ever looked at her before?

Has he really seen and not just looked at her?

Did he see her small nose, her mouth.

Did he ever notice her big gray eyes?

Has he noticed how the sun shimmers in her curly, blond locks?

Probably not.

Her restraint and silent admiration make her fade next to the vivacious Tracey.

Like a violet next to a rose.

But true beauty has nothing to do with how a person dresses and acts.

True beauty comes from the inside and the violet is so delicate, so lovely in fragrance that it keeps up with the rose in all its splendor.

Why doesn't Sasha recognize it?

Well, love can't be forced.

It's is like a force of nature.

Love comes when it feels like it, without notice and may be destructive as a tornado.

Smashing like a thunderstorm or joy bestowing such a ray of sunshine after a long winter months.

"Do you have the potions homework?" Tracey asks me on our way to Transfiguration.

"Yes, I finished it this morning," or better said: I transferred a copy of my old spells this morning to a new parchment and wrote the current date on it.

It can't hurt to get an "O" in Potions.

If you are in the Slug Club, you have uncommon benefits.

Especially since Riddle is also a member.

That's a good thing.

Snape would be proud of me if I'm one of Slughorn's favorites even in this time.

The Potions class rushed, hurried, and fled past me like the Hogwarts Express at full speed.

Rushed because my thoughts were everywhere else instead of being on my potion, after all, I had already brewed it before and it I could have done it in my sleep.

And fled because interesting subjects with which you get along (like Arithmancy) always pass quickly and fled since Casey blew her cauldron up ten minutes before the end of the lesson,and we were herded out of the classroom like a flock of chickens.

Normally Slughorn always makes two of his students stay and tidy up at the end of class.

Casey isn't a bad student, but her argument with James shook her more than she admits.

Thank Merlin he also noticed it and is speaking with her about it again before they go to lunch.

"Do you also think that Casey is exaggerating? What is so important about an one year anniversary anyway? " Tracey snorts derogatory next to me.

"I understand how she feels. I would at least want that my boyfriend knows the date of our anniversary. That's a lot of time, and in a year you can experience a lot, " I answer her.

"I don't think so. Everyday is like the other." Tracey snorts on.

"Heavens Tracey. We'll talk about it again when you meet the man of your dreams and he forgets this day, " I sigh.

As if on cue Riddle walks past us with an eyebrow waggling Mulciber.

Creep!

It's the seventh lesson for today.

Home Economics , my second favorite subject at school, just after Arithmancy.

Can you imagine anything more beautiful than to be dusted with flour and sprinkled with sugar while the oven is flying around your ears?

Probably not.

Or maybe yes...

Mulciber's pick-up lines after Arithmancy are the true highlights of the week.

"I think we can manage to bake a simple sponge cake," Tracey says excitedly as she opens her cookbook.

"We need eggs, sugar, vanilla sugar, flour and water ... water? Don't you normally put milk in a cake? "

"It doesn't mater", I reply with a shrug.

"Let's just do what it says in there, the author must have known what he wants from us. And I know that I won't fail this class. "

"Ok Hazel. Can you look for the ingredients that we need,and put them on the table? We need to separate the eggs as it says here ... "

And that's where the disaster begins today.

When we try to separate the eggs.

Each student, really each and everyone of them has managed to separate the eggs without accidents and whisk the egg whites until stiff with the sugar.

Well every student besides of us two of course.

As I try to separate the eggs the shells fall into the bowl with the egg yolk and then Tracey beats it so fast that the egg-whites...That it flies all over the place. I had told her that she shouldn't wave her wand around that wildly!

The whitish spots on my skirt look like glued on snowflakes.

Jacklyn has been watching the whole thing, giggling.

At least we could cheer her up with it.

I really pity her, even though I don't know how long she's been hopelessly in love with Sasha.

No one should be unhappily in love.

The feeling is cruel.

You feel torn and destroyed.

Lonely, and somehow you feel angry at yourself and everyone else in some moments, but you also feel happy every day, and its those moments that give you the strength to get through it all without falling into despair.

But for how long?

There are certainly many things that are worse, but not in the life of a young person ho still has to learn who she is and understand herself.

Many women don't understand themselves and their feelings for a lifetime, and wonder how their best friends do it.

But that's what friendship is for, to listen and get listened to, to understand and to be understood.

Friendship should go over everything, including falling in love, because friendship wipes the tears there where love beats the triggering wounds.

And that's the kind of friend that I would like to be for Jacklyn this year, and I will be, even if she has to be without me after that.

I can hardly stay here and throw away everything for which me and my friends fight for. But as long as I am here, I want to be a good friend to her.

As much as I love Tracey, she is anything but sentimental.

More like a Elephant in a glass shop.

She's great for practical jokes, but not for mourning and reflection. I think she uses her brother for such things.

After all, they are best friends.

It's nearly eleven, shortly before curfew.

I'm the last one in the library, I've been looking for a book that can help me in Arithmancy.

All my other homework is done only this is still pending.

This shouldn't be so difficult!

I just have to consult a few tables and solve the problems.

Quite simple.

In theory.

The practice is completely different.

Since I can't even keep the individual tables apart and have already got my first T.

Today I didn't have Arithmancy, but I have been pushing the homework for the whole weekend.

Maybe I should take Bells' offer and ask for help?

Even if it is embarrassing.

It is still better than to fail the subject and then to fail the O.W.L.s.

I frantically, throw a glance at my clock.

Crap!

The curfew begins in two minutes!

Quickly grabbing my bag I leave the library and run to the Gryffindor Tower.

Later that night as I'm laying in my bed staring at the closed curtains, I come to the conclusion to go to the library before breakfast to see if I can find a helpful book, instead of going trough the subjects that I understand.